


Today is One of Those Rarelys

by zenonaa



Category: Dangan Ronpa, Dangan Ronpa 3: The End of 希望ヶ峰学園 | The End of Kibougamine Gakuen | End of Hope's Peak High School
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-29
Updated: 2016-09-29
Packaged: 2018-08-18 10:32:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,786
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8159014
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zenonaa/pseuds/zenonaa
Summary: He jabbed his finger toward the message on the banner. “What’s the meaning of this?”“Can you not read it, Togami-kun?” she asked, deadpan.His glare burned like the dancing flames on the candles. “You know what I’m referring to!”“I was about to say,” said Yasuhiro nearby, seated at one of the clusters of desks. He flourished his skewered beef, wagging it as he spoke. “I spent all morning on it. One of the things that I can pride myself on is my penmanship...”Everyone wants to know why Fukawa is angry with Togami.





	

“Huh? Fukawa-chan is angry with _Togami_?” asked Aoi for the third time since the conversation started two minutes prior.

Kyouko nodded and replied, “Yes, that’s what I heard. I haven’t seen either of them since yesterday.”

Though Kyouko’s answer didn’t differ from the previous two that she gave, Aoi shook her head, brow furrowed, just as confused as before.

Touko could easily be provoked. Most of the time, it happened unintentionally, and even things like compliments and greetings needed to be handled with care, with a small whoop at most lest it chafe the hairs on the back of Touko’s neck and ignite a fire.

However, one rare exception, someone who could go above and beyond the limits to what Touko tolerated, did exist. Byakuya. He perhaps shouldn’t have had that immunity for Touko’s sake, but he still did, so when Yasuhiro told Aoi in the ground floor lounge that Byakuya achieved something not seen since the second trial in the mutual killings, Aoi rushed to the top of the building where Kyouko would be, who she could trust to know the truth.

Aoi scratched at her chin, heavy on eye contact. “But... But Fukawa-chan rarely ever gets angry with Togami.”

“Today is one of those rarelys,” said Kyouko and when Aoi continued staring at her, she shrugged and picked up the cup that she set onto her desk shortly after Aoi jogged in.

Finally accepting what Kyouko and Yasuhiro told her, Aoi asked, “Why is she mad at him?”

“That, I’m not sure,” replied Kyouko. She held her chin. “Togami-kun signed into work today but hasn’t been at his desk while Fukawa-san, according to Ando-san, is in one of the bathrooms.”

Kyouko paused and stroked her finger along the curve of the back of her ear.

“I wouldn’t advise probing into it unless you don’t fear getting burned. You know how tiresome they can be,” Kyouko added. She twitched her head, averting her eyes for only a moment  but long enough that when she intended to set her gaze back onto Aoi, she saw Aoi on the far side of the room.

The door grunted shut behind Aoi as she bounded down the corridor.

Before she started her search, she tried phoning Touko, but Touko declined her call after a few seconds. Of course Touko would be awkward and refuse to answer. Of course. Aoi sighed to herself, messaged, ‘Where are you?’ to Touko and slipped her phone into her shorts pocket.

Now began the hunt.

First, Aoi checked this floor’s girls’ bathroom. Annoyingly but not surprisingly, she found no signs of Touko in any of the cubicles. She puffed out her cheeks and decided that as she was already on the top floor, she should work her way down the building, visiting every bathroom, until she stumbled upon her friend.

Aoi could have popped in and out of the elevator as she descended, but she chose to charge down the stairs each time. Again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again.

On the seventh floor, she swung the door open and called out, “Fukawa-chan?”

Previously, either the buzz of the room’s lighting or in the case of the eighth floor, screaming and yelling from Ruruka, greeted Aoi, but the shriek here came from someone else and was familiar, and in most other situations would have been unwanted.

“Fukawa-chan!” Aoi cried out, a smile spreading across her face.

She couldn’t tell which of the five cubicles Touko was hiding in, so she dropped down to kneel and then rested her cheek against the cold, gritty floor, trying to spot Touko’s feet through the gap beneath the cubicles’ doors and walls.

“Is it you in there, Fukawa-chan? I can’t see you,” said Aoi.

“A-Asahina?” asked Touko from what seemed to be the furthest cubicle, so Aoi walked over to the door of that one.

Occupied. Locked. She dropped to her knees again but didn’t get the chance to investigate before Touko raised her voice.

“A-Are you trying to peep under the door?” asked Touko. “W-What... sort of person are you...? Acting all innocent and then doing something like that... I’ll report you to Sakakura!”

Aoi rose with a jolt and stepped back, hands flying up as if to protect herself despite there being a locked door between them. Face hot, Aoi said, “I just wanted to make sure it was really you!”

Touko snorted. “It is me. Heh, I can smell how disappointed you are...”

Inhaling through one’s nose in a bathroom could either be a pleasant experience or a gruesome one, so Aoi decided not to determine what disappointment smelled like.

A pout screwed her features anyway because of what Touko said.

For approximately one minute, neither spoke. Aoi fidgeted her foot.

“... Why were you looking for me, anyway?” asked Touko.

Aoi squinted and then remembered the reason she came here in the first place. Her expression slackened, she bounced her fists and she said, “We’ve hardly seen you all day and Kyouko-chan said you were angry with Togami, so you must be sad too, right? And that’s bad!”

Hissing erupted from Touko’s cubicle, like someone turned on one of the faucets behind Aoi.

“Fukawa-chan...?” asked Aoi, lowering her fists.

“It’s none of your business!” spat Touko. “S-Stay out of our affairs!”

Aoi gasped and flung her hands to her mouth, covering it. “You’re having an affair? So you were dating secretly after all!”

Touko howled pathetically and slammed her feet down as she sprung off the toilet. She didn’t open the door or even unlock it, like Aoi expected, but stood in her cubicle, grinding the toes of one leather shoe against the floor.

Still, better than nothing, and this at least hinted at the prospect of Touko opening up metaphorically and explaining what happened.

With bated breath, Aoi waited, but Touko kept quiet.

“Well? What happened between you two?” asked Aoi impatiently.

“W-Why do you think I want to tell you?” Touko snapped. “J-Just go away...”

“If he hurt you, I’ll punch him right between his beady eyes!” Aoi promised, and she punched her palm to show that she meant it. Even though Touko couldn’t see her do it, she must have heard the smack of skin against skin.

“You’ll do no such thing, you cow!” said Touko, hearing it, and she slammed the door open.

When Aoi saw her face, Aoi shrunk away, cowering, mind changed about wanting Touko to come out.

Teeth bared, Touko budged a foot forward. “He...”

She grabbed the base of her braids and scrunched up her face.

“He... c-called...”

Touko’s eyes prised open and she told Aoi what Byakuya did.

A door creaked in the hallway outside. Silence followed.

Aoi’s eyebrows floated up. “That’s what happened?”

Unable to look at Aoi, Touko bobbed her head and grunted a hum.

“... The bastard,” said Aoi, and she clenched her fist in front of her.

* * *

 

On the fourteenth floor, the doors of the elevator drew apart and Byakuya strode out, one hand in a trouser pocket. Of all the floors that Kazuo could have chosen for the meeting, he decided on his branch’s one all the way at the bottom of the building in contrast to where Byakuya was stationed, on the top floor.

Still, it wasn’t like Byakuya took the stairs, and the two minutes in the elevator along with the hour spent listening to a gruff allegory weren’t unwelcome. It all provided a distraction from his bubbling thoughts on what happened on his way to work that day. He quickened his pace, heading toward his branch’s open-plan office.

As highly as Byakuya’s colleagues regarded him, he hadn’t been promoted to branch head like one of his old classmates who was even his boss. His lips tingled but he reined in his scowl, though the dark cloud over his features remained, and at his destination, pulled the handle of the door down and entered.

A few steps in, Byakuya froze. He tilted his head back, eyes wide. Hanging from the ceiling was a banner that in bold lettering, said, ‘TOGAMI FUCKED UP’.

His eyes flickered like the dancing flames on the candles driven into the cake on a desk positioned in the centre of the room. Normally, rows of desks striped the office, with those of a lower status situated closer to the door leading into the corridor and those of a higher status positioned toward the other side of the room where the door to the head of the branch’s secluded office was. In this case, Kyouko’s.

For whatever reason, these desks had all been rearranged, most into pairs dotted around the room and a few lined up against the back wall, with various snacks and drinks placed onto them for the guests to enjoy. Several people pottered about, some not belonging to this branch, like Chisa on the far side of the room, currently engaged in conversation with Makoto, him eating a hotdog while she plucked sushi rolls off her plate.

In fact, it seemed that all of the Branch heads were in attendance.

Whoever organised this would die painfully.

Byakuya swept his eyes over the crowd and then pulled back his focus to the spot below the banner, where he sighted Kyouko, her arms folded over her chest.

He jabbed his finger toward the message on the banner. “What’s the meaning of this?”

“Can you not read it, Togami-kun?” she asked, deadpan.

His glare burned like the dancing flames on the candles. “You know what I’m referring to!”

“I was about to say,” said Yasuhiro nearby, seated at one of the clusters of desks. He flourished his skewered beef, wagging it as he spoke. “I spent all morning on it. One of the things that I can pride myself on is my penmanship...”

Yasuhiro’s shoulders slumped and his skewer lost momentum while he said that last part.

Byakuya allocated him a single glance before turning his attention back to Kyouko.

“Explain,” he demanded.

She inclined her head forward. “Togami-kun, I’m sure if you think about it, you’ll realise why the banner is so appropriate.”

He clicked his tongue. “I’m not in the mood for your games!”

Neither was Kyouko. She padded over to the punch bowl, where Ryota wringed an empty plastic cup.

His face twitched. Rather than listen to her advice, he stormed over to Yasuhiro, who heard his thundering footsteps and jerked his head back.

“Hagakure,” said Byakuya with his jaw as tightly clenched as his fists. “Explain. Now.”

“All I know is that you pissed off Fukawa-chi, ‘right?” Yasuhiro said, squeezing his eyes shut. He clasped his hands together, skewer sticking out through a gap between his fingers, and he shook them like begging for mercy.

Byakuya forgot some of his anger and blinked.

Yasuhiro dared open one eye.

“Hey, Togami-chi,” said Yasuhiro slowly, sorting through his vocabulary and picking out each word with care. “What did you do that got Fukawa-chi riled up? I mean, when I overheard her ranting to herself and found out she wasn’t a ghost, she told me to shut up when I asked if I should get you to calm her down... That’s not like Fukawa-chi at all, ‘right?”

“If you must know,” said Byakuya, “I told her that her ahoge looked ridiculous.”

Gasps pierced the air.

“Bastard!” shouted Aoi from the doorway. Everyone whipped their heads around and Byakuya realised she wasn’t the only new arrival. He could see Touko behind her.

Aoi stomped into the room. Byakuya didn’t run and hide, but he did tense and raise his arms.

She stopped in front of him, tipped back her head and hurled her arms outward, gesturing wildly. “What’s your problem? You can’t go and insult people’s hair like that.”

“If it’s any consolation, I think they’re all ugly,” said Byakuya, earning himself a scowl from Aoi and a flash of offence on Makoto’s face. The hotdog in Makoto’s hand was almost crushed into three pieces.

Before Aoi could rant about how wrong Byakuya was, Touko hunched her shoulders and piped up, “N-No... That’s not right, Byakuya-sama...”

Everyone stared at Touko, Aoi peering over her shoulder at her with sinking fists. Touko dragged her gaze off the floor and locked onto Byakuya, lips pinched together.

“Last night, I saw light dipping into my room from the crack beside the bathroom door, that had been left ajar. The digital clock showed the time to be two in the morning,” said Touko with a strained evenness to her voice. “I got up to find out what it was and that’s when I saw you, Byakuya-sama...”

They may as well have been the only two in the room, with how hushed it had fallen. The eyes of everyone else darted between Byakuya and Touko. Sweat crept down Byakuya’s face. He tweaked his collar, unable to look away from her.

Touko inhaled, trembling.

“... I saw you, Byakuya-sama, trying to gel a spike into your hair,” she said and the room erupted into chaos. Juzo even threw a chair at a wall.

“I was trying to wash out your drool from my hair,” said Byakuya, raising his voice in order to be heard over the buzz of conversation around them.

“Hypocrite!” yelled Aoi.

Kyouko quirked her brow at Byakuya but said nothing, simply watching his rising body temperature leak colour into his face, and that hit him just as hard as Aoi’s exclamation.

“How would that get drool out of your hair?” asked Yasuhiro, clutching his cheeks.

“These are really good,” remarked Kazuo as he chewed on a mini sausage. “Mm, delicious!”

“W-Wait, so Togami-kun was sleeping over at Fukawa-san’s place?” asked Makoto, who clearly hadn’t tasted one of the mini sausages yet or else he would have taken a moment to agree with Kazuo.

“That too!” said Aoi as she jabbed her finger toward Makoto.

Byakuya’s lips quivered. Yasuhiro jumped to his feet, sidled up to Byakuya and reached behind his back, where he had strapped on a ukulele. Before anyone had time to comprehend what was happening, Yasuhiro strummed its strings and broke into song.

“Togami-chi fucked up, he fucked up real bad,” Yasuhiro warbled. “Dishonoured the ahoge, came out with a half-assed excuse, and lost one of the few friends he ever had.”

Kyouko narrowed her eyes in an attempt to stay stern. Aoi tapped her chin, puzzled, and Makoto rubbed the back of his neck with a slight smile. A handful of background characters snickered, Chisa clapped and a new wave of heat flushed through Byakuya’s face.

He slowly turned his body around and then unexpectedly took off with a sudden burst of speed, sprinting out of the office.

Touko leaped aside to avoid being bumped into or ran over, and after a few seconds, chased after him, calling his name.

“I’ll never understand them,” said Aoi with a sigh and a shrug.

Nearby, Ruruka said, “Is this seriously all because of a dumb hair deformity?”

Ryota looked grim as he examined Makoto’s ahoge from afar. “T-There... is nothing dumb about wanting an ahoge...”

* * *

The air conditioning blew with a sound almost like a low ringing.

“Darling, you have to be born with an ahoge or earn it,” said Touko from behind Byakuya as she massaged his shoulders.

His chair creaked beneath him as he wiggled, getting comfortable. Well, it wasn’t really his chair, and it wasn’t even at his desk. The pair of them happened to be in the meeting room that he retreated to near the beginning of the day, following the argument he had with Touko on their way to work.

“They gave me my own novel,” grumbled Byakuya.

She hummed and dug her fingers into his knots. He groaned but found relief once the spike of pain faded.

“If that was enough, then Kirigiri would have an ahoge, wouldn’t she?” Touko pointed out in a light tone. “And Hagakure too... I don’t think his dreadlocks count. It has to be a game.”

Byakuya pressed his palms against his face and slouched forward, elbows on the desk. Touko kneaded his shoulders a bit more and then changed to rubbing circles onto his back, which his body accepted with no resistance.

She slipped her hands back onto his shoulders and stooped enough to murmur in his ear, “Do you want some coffee?”

“... Luwak.”

“Of course, darling.”

Touko let go and shuffled over to the door, but before she opened it and left, she looked back and asked, “Do you... really think my ahoge is ridiculous...?”

Byakuya didn’t move. “It... suits you.”

Even though he wouldn’t see it, she smiled and then walked out, and even though she wouldn’t see it, he smiled too.


End file.
